Tag: 2 eggs

How long do you think it took me to start baking cut out cookies from the day I bought a couple of sets of beautiful cookie cutter shapes? Two years. Is this normal, or is it just me, looking at them every time I open the drawer and thinking that one day, I will use them for something?
But procrastination aside, there are some amazing recipes out there for perfect cut out cookies and this is one of them. They have the perfect sweetness, brightened with a little addition of salt and even though the edges keep shape, the cookies are still soft and delicious inside.
You can ice them, put sprinkles on them and make them look really colourful but they are perfectly delicious without any icing.

This cookie dough requires chilling for one hour or freezing for 30 minutes. If you want your cookies to keep shape, don’t skip this step.

Take the butter and eggs out of the fridge and wait for them to become room temperature.
In a bowl, using a mixer or some elbow grease beat the butter until it becomes creamy. Slowly add the eggs and sugar and keep mixing so that the mixture is smooth.
Add the vanilla extract and almond aroma if using.
With a spatula, mix in the flour, salt and baking powder.

Roll the dough out on a piece of baking paper, cut the cookies out, take away the excess dough and roll more out on a new piece of baking paper. Continue until you have used up all of the dough. Stack the cookies on baking paper in layers, cover the last one with one more piece of baking paper and freeze for 30 minutes or chill in the fridge for an hour.
You can chill the dough in the fridge for the night, if you need to or you can freeze the cookies, or just a dough ball for later use.

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F.
Bake each sheet with cookies for 10 minutes.

This is a recipe for breakfast muffins featuring some yummy kale. They will not be very aerated and light because you have the banana, apple and kale but they are guaranteed to be delicious. I am only using 1/3 cup of sugar for this recipe which makes them sweeter than a slice of bread but definitely less sweet than a cake or a dessert muffin. So if you’d like some dessert muffins, go ahead and increase the sugar to half a cup. Or go with another one of my recipes for muffins.

These are always in season. No need to worry about finding the produce in store, the wine will be there, waiting for you.

Why are they freaky? The red wine gives them an unusual texture and bread-like aroma that makes them interesting and you end up eating another and another because you can’t quite put your finger on what is so special about them. I use a sweet variety of red wine for those but you can try with dry varieties if you’re hardcore. And you can also add red food colouring to be fancy and make an impression. Have fun making these and don’t worry about getting drunk, all of the alcohol evaporates while in the oven, so you might end up with a drunk oven (mine never complained about this).

Ingredients:

2 eggs

1/4 cup rapeseed oil

1/2 cup sweet red wine

1/2 cup milk

2 cups flour

3/4 cup sugar

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

optional: red food colouring (two drops should be plenty)

Yield: 12 muffins.

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F.

In a bowl, whisk eggs, oil, wine, milk and sugar until combined.

Add flour, baking powder and salt. Mix with a spatula until there are no more dry flour pockets.

These muffins are really something out of nothing. The ingredients are always in my cupboards and fridge and I know I can’t go wrong with this recipe. Sweet, comforting, with a little yummy sugar sprinkled on top – they disappear quickly. Storing them in the fridge brings out the best flavours from the cheese inside but they’ll be delicious in room temperature too. The more I look at these, the more I think they could play a major role in this year’s Halloween fare with some food colouring in all the right places. I’ll keep you posted anyway, as always!

In the meantime, enjoy these sweet, comforting little gems.

Ingredients:

for muffins:

2 eggs

1/4 cup rapeseed oil

1/4 cup applesauce (you can replace this with more oil if you have no applesauce)

3/4 cup milk

1/2 cup sugar

1 3/4 cup all purpose flour

1 1/4 tsp baking powder

1 tsp vanilla essence

3 tsp brown sugar to top

for filling:

1/2 cup cream cheese

3 Tbsp powdered sugar

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F.

In a bowl mix eggs, oil, applesauce, milk and sugar with a whisk until smooth.

Add flour, baking powder and vanilla essence and mix roughly until there are no more streaks of flour.

In a separate, small container mix cream cheese with powdered sugar until smooth.

Fill a 12 muffin tray alternating between the muffin dough, cream cheese and top with more muffin dough.

Whoever thought about combining lemon and poppy seed had a great idea. The zingy fresh flavour mixed with the darker flavour of poppy seeds never ceases to amaze me. They just go together so perfectly well!

As usual on my blog, these poppy puppies don’t require bringing out the heavy machinery, like mixers etc. Good old handheld whisk will do and you’ll have the most heavenly muffins in no time.

Ingredients for 12 muffins:

2 eggs

1/2 cup oil

3/4 cup milk

1/2 cup sugar

1 1/2 cup flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

zest from half a lemon, approximately 1 1/2 tsp

1 Tbsp poppy seeds

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F.

In a bowl whisk together eggs, oil, milk and sugar until smooth.

Add flour, baking powder, salt lemon zest and mix with a spatula.

Do not try to make the batter perfectly smooth, no need for that. These muffins will forgive you almost anything.

Add the poppy seeds and mix.

Fill 12 muffin cases and bake for 30 minutes.

If you are confused about zesting lemons and this is putting you off, here’s a one-minute explanation by Gordon Ramsay, because who doesn’t like to watch some Gordon?

Do you have any leftover muesli that nobody in your house wants to eat anymore and don’t know what to do with it?

These muffins are a way to get rid of a portion of it anyway and will be eaten without a clue. These are also muffins made partially with wholemeal rye flour but the recipe will work if you want to replace it with wheat flour. I like the rye in them though. It makes them a little darker and gives you more fiber as well, which can be handy if you’re having them for your breakfast.

Ingredients:

2 eggs

1/4 cup applesauce (it can be replaced with oil, you know the drill)

1/4 cup rapeseed oil

1 cup all purpose flour

3/4 cup wholemeal rye flour (finely ground)

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1 cup milk

4 Tbsp muesli

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F.

In a bowl, whisk eggs, applesauce, oil and sugar until smooth.

Add both flours, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and mix with a spatula, while adding milk, until the mixture is well combined.